Why does Rihanna keep going back to Chris Brown? That's the classic tainted love question, right? Why doesn't she just leave? It's a valid query, one I've asked about Rihanna (and countless other women) myself. But the bigger question, really, is this: Why did Chris Brown ever beat up Rihanna in the first place?

Well, just as the first logical place to begin analyzing Rihanna is her "Chris Brown is a nice guy and my daughter is fat" dad, the obvious starting point with Chris Brown is his mom, Joyce Hawkins. Not just because he's a boy and she's his mama and we all know that's where men get their "women issues," but because Hawkins clearly thinks her son is the next Messiah. And I'm not talking about the standard-level maternal tendency to underplay flaws and overemphasize accomplishments. I'm talking about -- for example -- the tweet (now deleted) Hawkins posted after The King of Pop passed away:

"MICHAEL JACKSON DIED SO CHRIS BROWN COULD LIVE!!!!!!"

I wasn't aware MJ and Chris Brown had a Voldemort/Harry Potter dynamic going on, but, um, you see my point about the Messiah thing.

Hawkins' entire Twitter account basically alternates between lavishing delusional amounts of praise on her son and defending him from those pesky haters who bristle at the idea of lavishing praise on a guy who has yet to accept any real responsibility for pounding in his girlfriend's face. Look, I'm not saying it's her duty to publicly apologize for her son's behavior, but going out of her way to refer to him as an "angel from God" (repeatedly) whose divine status somehow redeems him of any wrongdoing seems ... like a less-than-wise choice. This is a man with a history of violent behavior (remember when he smashed the glass window at GMA in a post-interview temper tantrum?). The constant excuses for his actions are irresponsible, to say the least. (A habit Hawkins and Rihanna have in common!) But at least now we know why Chris Brown seems to think he's blameless -- as far as the women in his life are concerned, he IS blameless.

Do you think the way Chris Brown's mother raised him has anything to do with his treatment of Rihanna?